Guild Wars 2

I’ve read dozens of posts in this forum and I’m throughly confused. Most posts talk about preferred style of play.

I like Range and Solo play in PvE. Like dungeons and fighting dragons.

Have never done WvW. Will probably never do PvP.

(I’ve already leveled a Ranger to 80. Ranger survives beautifully solo in Orr.)

Playing a Lvl 35 Elementalist using d/d almost 100% of time.

Love Fire 4 Ring of Fire and 5 Fire Grab, and Earth 4 Earthquake and 5 Churning Earth.

I’m not good at targeting so non-targeted AOE works great.

I need a ranged alternative for special situations.

I really have trouble with Fire – Burning Leap and Earth – Magnetic pull. Really dislike these. I get lost, or drop off cliffs or stairs.

Would like advice from experienced Elementalist on:
1. Using Specter/Dagger alternative. (I don’t think Staff is recommend. ?)
2. Balanced trait line – so I can solo but also play dungeons.
3. Any special runes, sigils or gear I need?

Anyone have a build that will adapt to my style of play.

This is a complicated question, so I really appreciate anyone taking time to answer.

Thanks, Ancient Angel Sage.

I don’t know how you can get off clifs with magnetic pull since it pulls you directly to target if it’s not obstructed or out of range. As for burning leap, well, don’t use it near the edges, it’s always a risk to fall off, or turn you’re camera in right direction so you don’t fall off. You could always go to water attunement if you want some range (you have 600 in range). I usually do this in dungeons to get some range from AoEs. Elsewise change to staff when you need to be at even further range, so bring two sets of weapon into dungeons. If you want to use scepter for more range than I’d say go for condition damage, while I feel that D/D and staff benefits more from direct damage (power). I think staff is overall better alternative if you want to go from d/d to some other weapon for range, since it got better support and more AoE. I found that most builds for d/d goes very well with staff as well.

Even as a D/D I carry staff, scepter and focus in my bags.

There are times where it is smart to use them.

I have almost 1000 hours on ele, so hope this helps. Once you feel you’ve mastered all that d/d has to offer, I encourage you to start running s/d, it is everything d/d is and more if used correctly in combo fields and blast finishers, and will give you the range you desire. It is almost impossible not to have 25 stacks of might with S/D unless you have no idea what a blast finisher is. I would encourage you to continue using d/d as it’s the easiest way to learn about aura’s and blast finishers, might stacking, boons, attunement swapping, etc. D/D teaches you how to be an ele, then you can move on.

Ele works best if stacking boons, especially might is a primary concerns, the damage will come from that. I almost never use my main attack 1 on purpose, there’s so much more you can be doing with so many skills at your disposal. Learn your combo fields and blast finishers. I am still surprised at how many lvl 80 ele’s I see in dungeons, pve and wvw that are pretty good, but just don’t really have a clue how to make this class shine. It’s painful how much that so many people are missing out on.

As Lysico said, know all your weps. If you’re never going to WvW, then there’s less of a need for that, but I’m constantly swapping wep sets between fights in WvW depending on what the situation requires.

You could consider running a cantrip build until you lvl up to 80, and once there a cantrip build at 10/10/10/20/20, or learn how to use Evasive Arcana in earth as an extra blast finisher in ring of fire correctly and run a 0/15/0/25/30 for solo PvE. Running the cantrip build with 10/10/10 fire/water/earth will net you might and protection from cantrips, and still get fury and swiftness from your aura’s. This will give you a bit more tankiness. Just pop Armor of Earth when your Churning Earth is casting so you can’t be knocked down, will give you protection and extra might from those 10 trait points in earth and fire.

This is a very elementary approach to the ele, but cantrips can help keep you alive until you really learn the mechanics. In my opinion, any ele I see running a cantrip build just doesn’t know what they’re doing yet, but hopefully they’ll get there. If you ever master the class, you probably wont use any of them, including Mist Form, which many consider mandatory, but it’s really only a “holy crap I’m about to die” button, not really necessary when your skill will eventually replace your need for the extra safety. In PvE once you learn the class, you’ll never bother. I’d argue Arcane Wave is the mandatory Ele utility skill, everything else is preference.

It’s a complicated class and takes time. Don’t get discouraged, it will eventually click and when it does you’ll be grateful you stuck it out.

I’m really eager to start testing scepter, since I only played in briefly in sPvP. However, it’s fun to discover different aspects of a class and I like to play around with builds. Scepter I haven’t used much outside sPvP, so I wanna see what it can do. But like most experienced eles say (I’ve only played mine for a month), you need to know all your weapon skills. But it takes time to master each weapon.